Atrocities On Adivasis

WAYANAD. IN the Western Ghats, with its waterfalls and wild game, is a tourist's paradise.But the artless, powerless Adivasis, native to this habitat, are terrorised by law out of their forestdwellings. Tired of false promises and betrayed by both political coalitions in Kerala, the Left DemocraticFront and the United Democratic Front, some of the tribals reoccupied a sparsely wooded area, Muthanga. Thisbrought the fury of the State down on their heads; the police showed their might. The tribals, refugees now intheir own land, are biding their time to assert their right to life guaranteed under the Constitution in printbut a bleeding mirage after the Muthanga carnage.

Their simmering rage is like a gathering storm which may imminently blow up in outragedassertion of their fundamental right to shelter and survival. Today, Muthanga is a symbol of Adivasi protestagainst their unjust privation. The woods are lovely, dark and deep but we have promises to keep!

The Adivasis of Kerala, as elsewhere, are humble in numbers, homeless have-nots in statuswith negligible political clout and live in landless despair. Even the Judiciary and, of course, the Executivetreat them as the Fourth World within the Third World. The Narmada tribals matter less, even for survival,than the kulaks who demand high dams denying them rehabilitation!

The rule of law blinks at them and politicians of all parties betray them. Thismicro-community, a little over one per cent of Kerala's population, is victim of social deprivation, dubiouspromises and dishonourable existence and suffers as derelicts and driftwood. Are they Indians? Yes. Are theyforest dwellers from ancient days? Yes. What is their distressing status today?

De facto discarded as flotsam and jetsam by the state and de jure profferedjungle slices which do not exist, these tribal communities have not even a trace of what once belonged tothem. The law plays hide and seek with these `specially favoured' children of the Constitution. Driven bydespair, they have begun to dare and demand rights.

This militant mood may explode justly any day, heedless of the lathi-wielding men in khaki,unless the Adivasi land question is settled with justice, equity and good conscience, weaving a jurisprudencewhich treats tribals as humans with title to survival. Kerala is an advanced State and if their destiny eventhere is terrorised travail, their lot in other parts of the country must be more pathetic.

Adivasis are mostly `vanavasis', forest-dwellers. They live in jungles, collect forestproduce and own small plots of cultivable lands. Their unlettered ways, their naivete make them easy prey toexploitation by cunning settlers from the plains who rob them of their land, leaving them without basic humanrights.

The endemic social disease of alienation of Adivasi holdings over the years became anextermination operation too unconscionable for the State to tolerate without legislative intervention. Soinaction ceased to be an option and land restoration legislation a compulsion.

In 1975, the Kerala legislature unanimously enacted the Kerala Scheduled Tribes(Restriction of Transfer of Lands and Restoration of Alienated Lands) Act. The legislation had a mission —the redemption of dispossessed, destitute tribals in distress.

Had this Act been implemented with the social passion which drove the House intosalvationary locomotion, the tribal revolt at Muthanga would never have happened. Alas, this legislativemanoeuvre proved to be a dastardly double deception — an illusion of rehabilitation and a design ofnon-implementation. The tribal innocents were stabbed in the back by deliberate default in not notifying thelaw for years, after being doped and duped by a statutory pretence of restoration of their alienated land. Thepeople of the State who sympathised with the tribal proletariat were left with a deception of land legislationwhich was deliberately allowed to slumber.

The canny neo-settlers meanwhile developed the lands, defying the legislation and silencingsuccessive Governments run in turn by Fronts of `radicals' and `democrats.' In politics, adjectivalnomenclature is Orwellian double-speak, meaning the opposite of what it seems to say. Every party professedsupport to the Adivasis; every party had opportunity to enforce the law while it was in office but not onerestored even an acre of alienated land.

The non-tribals settled on these lands, encroached on more neighbourhoods; and theforest-dwellers were disowned by the forests. To recover the lost land from the encroachers, the Governmenthad to implement the law with conviction for the cause, compassion for the powerless.

The settlers, large in number and well-organised under various political flags, could notbe dislodged. The scattered Adivasis, with a stillborn law in the statute book, had but futility and mockery.Imagine the seriousness of a Government which has been ruled by two rival Fronts, treating the law as all butdead. The Left Front slept a while but woke up late. The rules were at last framed more than a decade later,and given effect to from January 1982. This was mere jugglery with the calendar. The law, as a ground reality,was not implemented and so the Adivasis wandered in the jungle with not a cent to claim as their own.

Then came one P. Nallaambi Thera who filed O.P. No.8879/88 before the Kerala High Courtseeking implementation of the Act. It is unfortunate that even the CPI (M)-led Government was guilty ofinsouciance. There were 8,088 cases pending under the Act for restoration and yet orders were passed only in1,201 cases and, alas, only in three cases did actual restoration take place.

The grossest contempt for the Adivasi plight is thus clearly evident. Today, the Left Frontis violently vitriolic against the Congress Government for betrayal of the tribals but its performance whilein power is a dubious chapter.

The High Court was more progressive and loyal to the law than the noisy political partiesand directed the Government to dispose of all pending restoration applications within a period of six monthsfrom 15-10-1993. Despite the High Court directive, the Government dawdled, delayed and deprived the tribals oftheir dues. Ultimately, the High Court ordered peremptory compliance.

The lack of sincerity of the Left Front in power became manifest when instead of givingland under the 1975 Act as ordered by the High Court, a legislation largely sapping the original Act wasbrought under the guise of an amendment in 1996. The sabotage of Adivasi expectations was the impact of thisamendment. But a contradiction in history took place. The Marxist bill was withheld assent by the Presidentwho was advised by the Congress Cabinet to do so. A student of dialectical materialism has much to explore inthis curious anti-climax.

THE BANKRUPTCY of socialist sympathy for the landless Adivasi is evident from the fact thatthe Kerala Government moved the High Court, time after time, to gain more time to fulfil the obligations underthe Kerala Scheduled Tribes (Restriction of Transfer of Lands and Restoration of Alienated Lands) Act, 1975.Finally, the High Court granted time for the Government to give right and justice to the tribal proletariat byJanuary 5, 1999. The time so gained was used for the oblique purpose of passing a new bill, namely the KeralaRestriction on Transfer by and Restoration of Land to Scheduled Tribes Bill, 1999.

The tribals were political lightweights — the settlers and others who had seized Adivasilands had tremendous political clout. Inevitably, the new bill was enacted and the progressive bill of 1975repealed. Litigation followed in the shape of petitions in the High Court and the Supreme Court. Contemptproceedings were also instituted and the fate of these proceedings depends on the final verdict on the appealnow pending in the Supreme Court.

A new chapter of non-viable commitments by the Chief Minister, A. K. Antony, of the UDF wasmade on October 16, 2001, at a conference where C.K. Janu, leader of the Adivasis, took militant part. Landfor every Adivasi family was the basic understanding.

Wayanad district is where the Adivasis are hard hit in landless destitution. But Wayanad iswhere, under the 1971 Act, vast extents of private forests were vested in the State, compensation free. Anaffirmation was made that land from these vested forests may be identified and allotted to the landlessAdivasis, of course, after securing the Central Government's approval. The deplorable fact remains that mostof the Scheduled Tribes are duped.

The Kerala Private Forest Vesting and Assignment Act, 1971, was upheld as a measure ofagrarian reform. Section 10 of the Act obligated the State to assign vested forestland to property-lesstribals. In breach of the promise by the Chief Minister, and mindless of the constitutional urgency of landallotment, the State Government sought an option in inaction infuriating the tribals.

Perhaps, the alibi was that a Central Forest Conservation Act was brought into force in1980 and any assignment of forestland needed the approval of the Centre.

Had the 1975 Act been implemented, the 1980 Central Act, then unborn, could hardly havebeen a hindrance. The problem now is to secure large extents of land to settle the Adivasis. The apparentimpasse can be surmounted, given the political will. Some measures may be considered in the context of thegrave crisis which looms large over the whole State after the battle of Muthanga.

Why did the Adivasis occupy Muthanga? The jurisprudence of tribal despair is `do or die'justice!

Who deprived the tribals of their lands? The settlers from the plains. It is true that theysold away their belongings at home and settled in large numbers dispossessing the tribal population by pettyallurements and tricky operations. Gaining a foothold, they expanded by encroachment.

Of course, arriving with their culture and working hard on the hilly terrain, they madeimprovements, cultivated crops, built homesteads, constructed schools and established churches.

This civilising mission eclipsed the Adivasi flock; and the uprooted chunk of humanitybecame alien in its own land, desperate for a source of survival and slaving for rightless existence. Historicjustice may well warrant redistribution of the lost land and rehabilitation of the rootless diaspora.

The moral foundation of the 1975 Act is the re-taking of the alienated land forre-settlement, but the intervening period of development in which the settlers had, with blood and toil, addedto the value of the land and created a new homeland became a reality which could not be wished away. At thesame time, the forlorn aboriginals morally and legally deserved reinstatement.

The obvious source of land for resettling them was, therefore, retaking a reasonable slicefrom the settlers from the plains. Perhaps exceptions may have to be made to exclude from resumption churchbuildings, schools, essential community centres and the like. Where there has been expansionist encroachmentof the Adivasi land, there is clear justification for evicting the occupants. There will be resistance,especially because the occupying community is politically powerful.

Indeed, the State's inexcusable delay in implementing the 1975 Act and the legislative andlitigative strategies to undo the 1975 Act prove beyond reasonable doubt the culpable operations of thesettlers. Today, when a violent crisis is brewing, the mood has to change, the mind-set has to become sternerand the commitment to restorative justice uncompromising. If this new locomotive of land redistribution wereadopted without hanky-panky, a substantial portion of land can be given back to the landless tribals.

The Government can, on a war footing, survey the encroachments, discover and recover theextra land so occupied and, on just terms of compensation, give it back to the Adivasi. Fifty committeesspread over Malabar with Adivasi representatives and technical services of land surveyors can finish thisoperation in a few months' time.

Immediate orders must be passed vesting in the local tribals the encroached land. Will theGovernment, what with its commitment and legislative backing, undertake a blitz operation? No. The bourgeoisState Cabinet is anti-tribal when it comes to restoration, phoney professions notwithstanding.

Indeed, the tribal is part of bio-diversity and is its sentinel rather than its hostile.Based on this fundamental, the Forest Policy Statement of 1988 was formulated, propounding the philosophy of`symbiosis of tribal and forest', harmonising this duality. This ecological confluence of aboriginal and hisforest milieu, if applied to the Kerala Adivasis and their arboreal haven, will happily resolve the presentconfrontation and clashes.

The Government must not lose a sense of priority in regard to land ownership. The firstcharge on land for sheer survival belongs to the aboriginal, the last claim, viewed from a value base, belongsto huge corporations. In Kerala, large (excessive) forestland for alleged plantation and other purposes arewith big business houses such as the Tatas, Gwalior Rayons, etc. Those lands must instantly be taken over bythe State and made over for Adivasi occupation. This will relieve the scarcity situation a great deal withouttears.

A compassionate forest legislation is constitutionally permissible for the State, with theconcurrence of the Centre, restoring the traditional forest resources to the tribals. All that is needed isfor the Government and the people of Kerala to decide on whose side they are — with the needy tribalproletariat or the greedy feudal proprietariat.

What can one say about Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer, 88 but youthful as ever, that would do justice to him? Weleave it to you to find out more -- here's a mere link to onesite.